API: engine kw to .plot to enable selectable backends · Issue #14130 · pandas-dev/pandas (original) (raw)

We have had some conversations in the past regarding an .plot(....., engine=) kw. in #8018
This would allow pandas to redirect the plotting to a user selectable back-end, keeping matplotlib as the default.

see chartpy here, for a way to selectively enable matplotlib, bokeh and plotly.

and generically via altair.

Missing from here is when to re-direct to seaborn.

So this issue is for discussion:

1. should we do this
2. implementation method and minimalist dependencies to actually do this (ideally pandas would add NO dependences itself, just import for a particular engine, raising if its not available).
3. maybe should spin off much of the current pandas code into a separate repo (pandas-plot)?
   and this actually should be the default (rather than matplotlib), which is of course the dependency. This might allow simply removing the vast majority of the custom plotting code.